Urgent Help Needed

[mistressgi]

Right lads!

I am in a right bind here. Here is my story:

Bought a celica 1998 in Rep Ireland last year it is a japanese import E-ST202-BLMVF (initially importd to the UK in 2008 and to ireland in 2010).

I Love love love my car, in the meantime I left Ireland to come to Portugal and I want to legalize it here (currently trying to anyway).

This is where all the trouble starts.

Initially was told I needed a certificate of conformity for this, no such certificate exists since 1. My car is a 1998 vehicle (COC not mandatory then) and 2. This model was made exclusively for the japanese market therefore they never een bothered with this nonsense.

Now, I can submit two other things

1. An official Toyota spec sheet for my model (ideally)

2. Owners manual

Of course I do not have either of them.

This is what I have tried:

Toyota Dublin - cannot seem to get a human on the phone

Toyota UK - told me via email they will issue no such documents

Toyota US - Told me to get in touch with the UK or Ireland

Toyota Portugal - ignored me all together

Toyota Japan - told me that they would not issue such a documento for a car that was taken out of japan by an individual

Now I am at a loss on what to do.

I was hoping people here would have any ideas on how to get this illusive spec sheet.

Thanks for reading and looking forward to reading your thoughts

[FROSTYBALLS]

Presumably the various sales organisations within Toyota (eg. Toyota GB, etc) will only provide spec sheets for models they officially sell.

They won't know the specifications for Japanese market vehicles, and won't have any information on these.

[mistressgi]

This is true but they are in a better position to contact their Japanese counterparts if they wanted to help.
I think i'll end up having to write a letter to Toyota Japan to see if they would send me this info. Believe it or not they do not seem to have an email address!!!

[FROSTYBALLS]

The problem you may face is that if one writes to Toyota Corporate, more often than not, they will just refer your enquiry to one's local sales organisation - in your case Toyota Portugal.

You could try contacting Toyota Europe, which is the umbrella organisation for Toyota within the European continent, to see whether they can help.

Aside from that you could try contacting companies who handle grey imports from Japan to see whether they may have a spec sheet for your car or whether they know a source for these.

[mistressgi]

Well, just a quick update.

I've finally heard back from toyota ireland - it is a no go

I've contacted toyota europe to see if they would send me the specs (crossing my fingers).

And I've tracked down a couple of owners manuals, for st202 celica's, I ordered them and now again crossing my fingers, hopefully they will match my car!

Ah well, back to waiting again!

If anyone else has any ideas, please let me know.

Many thanks to Frostyballs for the Toyota europe link!

[TomdeGuerre]

On the basis that officialdom loves paperwork get a copy of the Road Vehicles (Construction and Use) Regulations 1986 and submit this along with whatever other documentation you have. If you have any MOT certificates or similar include these along with anything else with an official stamp or heading on it.

Claim that the vehicle complies with "all appropriate" sections of the regulations then let them thumb through all 186 pages to see if they come up with anything. Officialdom usually loves to cover its backside with plenty of paperwork and regs so who knows? It might work.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1986/1078/contents/made

[FROSTYBALLS]

On the basis that officialdom loves paperwork get a copy of the Road Vehicles (Construction and Use) Regulations 1986 and submit this along with whatever other documentation you have. If you have any MOT certificates or similar include these along with anything else with an official stamp or heading on it.

Claim that the vehicle complies with "all appropriate" sections of the regulations then let them thumb through all 186 pages to see if they come up with anything. Officialdom usually loves to cover its backside with plenty of paperwork and regs so who knows? It might work.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1986/1078/contents/made

May not help as the OP is importing the car from Republic of Ireland to Portugal.

[mistressgi]

Well, got somewhere with Toyota Japan, no specs sheet but they tracked down an original owners manual in japanese and they will send this to me.

I'll submit that plus a couple of specs I can find online, I will try and convince someone in toyota to stamp these for me (I'm not holding my breath though). I shall submit all of this including the last NCT I did etc and will see where I get!

Thank you for all your help and I'll keep this updated as I go along :), it may help someone else!